Deleting audio in an audio clip in session view

[Metzler000]

Ok. So I have an audio clip and want to delete a portion of audio from the clip in session view. I select the portion of audio I'd like to delete and hit delete and nothing happens. I've heard others say you can do it in arrangement view, but I'm not ready for to start arranging anything yet, I just want to get my clip sounding right. How do you do this? And if you're forced to do it in arrangement view can anyone explain a logical reason WHY you have to do it this way. This seems absolutely anti-intuitive and absolutely inefficient. You shouldn't have to study the manual and jump through hoops to do something absolutely so basic as deleting a portion of audio from an audio clip. This seems like a function that should have been in Live version 0.1. Can anyone explain this to me?

Mark

[S4racen]

Read the manual and stop whinging...

Cheers
D

[Metzler000]

Why do people bother posting "read the manual"? How is that helpful? I've read two books on Ableton and most of the manual. Maybe I just find it difficult to remember things that MAKE ABSOLUTELY NO FUCKING SENSE. I have better things to do than searching a manual for something that should be intuitive to any computer user. If I have to read the manual to do something that's so simple in other DAWs, perhaps Ableton was the wrong choice. People want to make music, not spend hours trying to figure out the most basic things. I thought Germans were supposed to be logical. Select and delete...why is this rocket science? I'll take you're answer to mean Ableton sucks and you have no real answer. Thanks.

Mark

[S4racen]

The answer is that Clips in Session View have non-destruvtive editing, you can change their loops points and start points, you want any more than that drag the clip to arrange, make the changes you want, consolidate clip and drag it back to session...

Alternative automate the Volume Envelope...

All of this is covered in the manual and is how Live works, which makes absolute sense, you need to use a different DAW if you're feeling this way already....

Cheers
D

[Metzler000]

Ok, non-destructive editing is at least a reasonable reason. I still feel like having to go into arrangement mode is awkward and doesn't make sense. Arrangement should be for arranging music. If I'm just building sounds why should I be forced to go into arrangement view? If non-destructive editing is important, than each clip should have a lock icon on it by default. You should be able to right click the clip and select unlock so that destructive editing can occur without going into arrangement view. Even in arrangement view you can't select audio in the detailed panel at the bottom and delete portions. I went to the manual appendix and there was nothing under audio editing or editing audio. Frustrated, I figured I'll just read the arrangement view section again. For the Live 9 manual it starts on page 87. One page later on 88 they have sections of the arrangement view labeled 1-6, but down below when it describes these functions, it's numbered 6-11. Like seriously? They didn't even proofread this? All this just gives the impression that there are a couple guys building this program as a side job rather than dedicating time to build a professional product. Just my opinion. Thanks for the info though.

Mark

[mholloway]

Ok, non-destructive editing is at least a reasonable reason. I still feel like having to go into arrangement mode is awkward and doesn't make sense. Arrangement should be for arranging music. If I'm just building sounds why should I be forced to go into arrangement view? If non-destructive editing is important, than each clip should have a lock icon on it by default. You should be able to right click the clip and select unlock so that destructive editing can occur without going into arrangement view. Even in arrangement view you can't select audio in the detailed panel at the bottom and delete portions. I went to the manual appendix and there was nothing under audio editing or editing audio. Frustrated, I figured I'll just read the arrangement view section again. For the Live 9 manual it starts on page 87. One page later on 88 they have sections of the arrangement view labeled 1-6, but down below when it describes these functions, it's numbered 6-11. Like seriously? They didn't even proofread this? All this just gives the impression that there are a couple guys building this program as a side job rather than dedicating time to build a professional product. Just my opinion. Thanks for the info though.

Mark

Live doesn't have an on-board destructive audio editor. It's been requested, but it simply doesn't exist at this time, and has not, to date, been a part of Live's design. If that throws you into a frothing rage, go use a different DAW and spare us your moaning. If you can handle it, there are two workarounds: 1. choosing an external editor in Prefs that Live will open automatically when you click the little edit button for the clip, or 2. moving over to arrangement (as already discussed) to cut, move, splice & re-consolidate into new clips, thereby performing destructive editing, albeit somewhat indirectly (it does work though).

But essentially, again, your rant above could be summed up very quickly as: Hey, there's no actual destructive audio editor included inside Ableton Live 9. Yes, correct. Now proceed accordingly...

-M

[Metzler000]

Oh, I'm sorry. Is it not appropriate to be frothy when you spend $800 for Live and can't select and delete audio like you can in the free GarageBand? Yes, how dare I expect a basic function in what's supposed to be a professional application.

Ok, whatever, I guess I'll just have to accept that it makes no sense to have to go into arrangement view and that I've spent hours trying to do something that can't even be done in session view. Is it any wonder I forgot I had to go into a separate part of the program when the waveform is staring me right in the face in session view? Thanks for the help. Hopefully I'll remember next time.

Mark

[Metzler000]

Just so I don't waste another 3 hours...can you do this in Sampler, or is that a no go as well?

What external editor would you suggest that's both powerful and intuitive?

Is DWIFH your band? I think I've heard of it before. I'm also in the industrial scene. I listened to a song on Spotify and it sounds pretty good compared to a lot of what's out there. Do you mix/master in Ableton as well, use another program, or send it out?

Mark

[mholloway]

Just so I don't waste another 3 hours...can you do this in Sampler, or is that a no go as well?

What external editor would you suggest that's both powerful and intuitive?

Is DWIFH your band? I think I've heard of it before. I'm also in the industrial scene. I listened to a song on Spotify and it sounds pretty good compared to a lot of what's out there. Do you mix/master in Ableton as well, use another program, or send it out?

Mark

I understand you're frustrated, but try to remember that your expectations of what any given DAW "should" have or what is "professional" aren't always going to line up perfectly. I mean, that's exactly what you're finding here. Live has never had an on-board destructive audio editor. Obviously that's shocking to you, fair enough. But that doesn't mean it's not a professional music app (I use it professional every day, fwiw), it means it offers a different set of specific tools than what you imagined. I could spend all day writing a list of everything Ableton can do that Garageband can't, but why bother? Every program is different, some overlap more than others, blah blah...

So, specifically for audio editing I use Adobe Audition. Even if I used a different DAW like Logic, I'd still want to use Audition for audio editing because I find the on-board destructive audio editing in Logic and Studio One to be practically worthless. Cubase, otoh, has really great audio editing features. I hear ProTools does, as well, but I wouldn't know. But so it goes! These programs are not identical, and it would frankly suck if they were.

Yeah, Dead When I Found Her is my project. I have two full length albums out there (signed to ArtOfFact records) and a new one, my third, coming out this November. All these albums were written & produced with Ableton Live - fwiw.

btw, it might help you to learn/understand Live's (VERY deep) Clip Envelope system. For example, if I had an audio loop and wanted it to only play the first half, then silence, I wouldn't delete half the audio destructively, I would simply create an envelope in the clip for the "volume" property of the clip, which mutes the output during that second half. If i wanted it to loop the first half only (thereby 'getting rid' of the second half) I'd just adjust the loop points of the audio, or Crop it.

-M

[[jur]]

Please, calm down dear cowboys!

Metzier, if you need to cut the beginning or the end of a clip in Session you can:
- set the samples's start/end point (with the little flags or the nice little boxes in the "sample" section)
- right-click on the waveform and select "crop sample"
voilà!

For more advanced editing, Arrangement is your friend, no need for any external editor. I'm sure you'll soon get comfortable with Live's concepts and that this method will then makes sense for you.

cheers
Julien

[urbanhouse]

Hi!
In Session View:
1. In the audio clip, select the part you want to keep.
2. Right-click on the selected part and select "Crop Sample".
3. Done.

[Barra79]

Hi!
In Session View:
1. In the audio clip, select the part you want to keep.
2. Right-click on the selected part and select "Crop Sample".
3. Done.

If you just want to delete a few milliseconds of latency silence from the start of the clip, you can highlight the start of the clip you want having zoomed in and then hold shift to quickly move to the end of the clip to select the end. Then you choose crop.

[unami]

@mholloway - thanks for posting part of your workflow. Helps us newbies learn.

Listening to Downpour as I write this. You are very talented.

[MagicCamera]

Read the manual and stop whinging...

Cheers
D

Seriously? Help the user instead of being a really "not very helpful and not very nice person". If you are going to post these types of responses you should reconsider "Why bother" if you won't help.

[fishmonkey]

Read the manual and stop whinging...

Cheers
D

Seriously? Help the user instead of being a really "not very helpful and not very nice person". If you are going to post these types of responses you should reconsider "Why bother" if you won't help.

i smell a stinky sock puppet with a blunt axe to grind...